Tag: self-care
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Self-Discipline ≠ Punishment
Years ago, I horribly injured my foot hiking a local trail. This was a hike I had hiked countless times without issue. And yet, I headed up that slope without stretching and came home barely able to walk. If I had any commonsense, I would have gone to a doctor and taken appropriate measures to…
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It’s the Least Wonderful Time of the Year
Dreadful January. After all the cheery decorations get packed away, the friends and relatives end the revelry and return to their respective homes, and we all stop eating special foods to celebrate every single holiday, we are faced with a sobering reality. With its bills piling up and short daylight hours, January strips us of…
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Boundaries Matter
As we stare into the vortex of peak chaos that we call the holiday season (Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, the start of a new year…), chalk full of festivities with friends and family, allow me to be the first to reassure you that your boundaries matter. Your feelings matter. If no one else will validate…
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Enemies, Foreign…and Domestic
I took a solemn oath when I enlisted in the Army that I would defend the United States Constitution against enemies both foreign and domestic. During training, I was taught how to fight the enemy. Sadly, nobody took the time back then to prepare me for the battle brought into my life near the end…
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A Few of My Favorite Things
I’m a list maker. I find satisfaction in brain-dumping what rolls around in my mind onto a piece of paper so the thoughts upstairs don’t drive me absolutely batty or threaten to instigate a system overload. I love the little dopamine boost I get by checking things off my neat little lists. I even add…
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Mind the Gap
It is most likely that you didn’t notice because people think of us far less often than we fear they do, but I have been silent here for a few weeks. I was blogging weekly, all written and scheduled in advance, and then I took it all down because the last thing I want to…
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Journaling for Dummies
Many people say that they keep a diary to write down events that occur and how they feel about things. It’s rare to hear someone state that they keep a journal. Aren’t they one and the same – interchangeable terms? Well, not really… A diary is a book someone keeps to record events in one’s…
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From Drab to Dazzling: Making a Beautiful Life
For as long as I can remember, art has been a central part of my life. It all began with my gorgeous grey-haired grandma (or GGG, as I affectionately call her), who sang opera while dusting family furniture as a child, took a chemistry class in college during WWII to learn how to create beauty…
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My Ever-Expanding Bucket List
I took my place on center stage in front of the director and briefly introduced myself. He asked me why I was auditioning for the theatrical production and my response startled him: auditioning for a play was on my Bucket List. In case you’ve been living under a rock forever and don’t know, the term…
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Chasing Dopamine
It all started innocently enough – the crazy antics, the silly mannerisms, the hair-brained schemes – but what began as an overabundance of youthful energy became a lifestyle and here I am: a woman in her mid-*coughcough*-rties who is a crazy mishmash of organized spontaneity and anxious exuberance for life. Somewhere between paying a taxi…
Wisdom from the Trenches 